Bobby. wrote on Nov 22
nd, 2014 at 4:01pm:
Brian Ross wrote on Nov 22
nd, 2014 at 3:24pm:
Bobby. wrote on Nov 22
nd, 2014 at 9:49am:
polite_gandalf wrote on Nov 22
nd, 2014 at 9:03am:
well you could always reference the 100 times I mentioned it before. I'm sure the master of necroposting should be able to do that.
Was Muhammad a pedophile or not?
By the standards of the day? Most probably not. Social mores were very different and marriages were entered into for many reasons other than just merely "love", Bobby. Often, considerably older men married considerably young women, even children as a consequence. The "age of consent" either didn't exist or was often considerably lower than today's. Even until quite recently, some European nation-states had ages of consent set at 12, whereas in the United States some states had them as low as 9 at the turn of the 20th century.
Judging what occurred 1400 years ago by the social mores of today is fraught with difficult and rather naive IMHO. As L.P.Hartley puts it, "The past is a foreign country: they do things differently there".
Don't weasel out of it:
ramming a 9 year old is pedophilia.
You are judging what happened 1400 years ago, Bobby by modern standards. As I keep pointing out, women were often married off, as they were after all, essentially chattels to be done with as one wished, for strategic and financial alliances. This occurred often at very young ages:
Æthelwulf, King of Wessex from 839 CE until his death in 858 CE, married Judith of France, 12 years old, the daughter of Charles the Bald, King of the West Franks when he was 58. His own daughter, from a previous marriage, Æthelswith (c. 838-888 CE) became Queen Æthelswith when she married King Burgred of Mercia in 853 CE, when aged 12.
Henry VII's mother, Margaret Beaufort, Countess of Richmond and Derby (31 May 1443 – 29 June 1509) was 12 when she married the 24-year-old Edmund Tudor on 1 November 1455 CE. When Edmund died in 1456 CE of the plague in captivity at Carmarthen the following November, leaving a 13-year-old widow who was seven months pregnant with their child. However, that wasn't even her first marriage. Her first marriage occurred when she was was perhaps a year old but certainly no more than three. However, there is more evidence to suggest they were married in January 1450 CE after Suffolk was arrested and looking to secure his son's future. Papal dispensation was granted on 18 August 1450 because the spouses were too closely related and this concurs with the later date of marriage.
Isabelle D'Angoulême, married King John of England in 1200 CE, her exact date of birth is uncertain, and estimates place her between at most 15 and more probably towards nine years old at the time of her marriage. John was 34.
Isabella of Valois, queen of Richard II of England, was six years old when she became queen consort. When he died, she was only 10, in 1400 CE.
At the age of seven, Margaret of Luxembourg was married in 1342 CE to Louis I of Hungary.
Henry the Young King of England, born 1155 CE, married Margaret of France, born 1157 CE, in 1160! Their only child, William was born in 1177 CE.
Margaret I, Countess of Burgundy (aged 10 at the time of marriage)
The daughter of Philip III of France, she married Louis I, Count of Flanders in 1320 CE, aged just 10.
Joan I of Navarre (aged 10 at the time of marriage) The daughter of Henry I of Navarre and Blanche of Artois (and Queen Regnant of Navarre herself), she married Philip IV of France in 1284 CE, aged just 10. She had her first child at 14.
Isabella of France (aged 12 at the time of marriage) The daughter of Philip IV of France married Prince Edward, the Prince of Wales (future Edward II of England) in 1308 CE, aged just 12. They had become engaged in 1303 CE, when she was 7 and married by proxy in 1305 CE.
Margaret of Provence (aged 13 at the time of marriage) The eldest daughter of Ramon Berenguer IV, Count of Provence and Beatrice of Savoy, she married Louis IX of France aged just 13 in 1234 CE.
The list of dynastic marriages is rather long, Bobby, were they all Paedophiles as well?